08 April 2016 10:17 AM

That list in full - Violent major criminals who have used cannabis

Last night I took part in a debate on cannabis legalisation at the University of Sussex, a place I last visited (in an unsuccessful attempt to obtain a place there, which in those days involved an interview) in 1969.

The result was as usual. I won the debate, and lost the vote. I expect there'll be a Youtube version in time, as it was recorded. It was a reasonably lively and combative occasion.

My main concern as always is to sow seeds of doubt in the minds of my opponents, which may bear fruit many years from now. It takes courage to vote for me in public at such a place, and I'm grateful to those who did.

Anyway, expecting the inevitable claim that marijuana is a peaceful drug, I drew up a list of the major crimes, some political, some not, whose perpetrators or alleged perpetrators have been found, either through police records or the testimony of their acquaintances, to be cannabis users.

I thought I'd reproduce it here. The order is random. The usual caveat applies. All I am saying here is that ultra-violent crime is a subset of crime as a whole, which is distinguished by being thoroughly covered by the media. This information is available about the criminals which is not available about most criminals.

I would like to see the police and courts compelled by law to investigate and record the drug use of all persons convicted of violent crime, and for the results of this recording to be the subject of an inquiry into an apparent correlation. That is all. Anyone who says I have said anything else is making it up. They will. Please disregard it.

All the following are known cannabis users:

The mass killer on the beach in Sousse, Tunisia, Seifeddine Rezgui. Jared Loughner, culprit of the 2008 Tucson massacre in which six died and Congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords was terribly wounded.

Deyan Deyanov, killer (by beheading) of Jennifer Mills-Westley in Tenerife, Nicholas Salavador, killer, by decapitation, of Mrs Palmira Silva in London, Michael Adebolajo and Michael Adebowale killers of Lee Rigby, Cherif and Said Kouachi, and Ahmedy Coulibaly, culprits of the Charlie Hebdo Killings. Ibrahim and Saleh Abdeslam, and Omar Ismail Mostefai, culprits of the Bataclan killings in Paris last November, Martin Rouleau, killer of of an unnamed Canadian soldier (unnamed by the choice of his family) in St Jean-sur-Richelieu in October 2014, Michael Zehaf Bibeau, killer of another Canadian soldier, Nathan Cirillo in Ottawa, also in October 2014, Jonathan Bowling and Ashley Foster, killers of the Sheffield church organist Alan Greaves, beaten to death for no reason, Ayoub el-Khazzani who attempted a terrorist outrage on the Thalys train between Amsterdam and Paris.

Comments

I meant that we took our toddlers to clinics and had health visitors up to about two years of age.

I don't know if PH has also read of the awful case of the young woman so brutally murdered by then two 13 and 14 year old girls in an attack over many hours.

The victim had been under social services, had mental health problems and was an alcoholic and had been in and out of prison.

The two girls, one had come from a dysfunctional family the other in care for her behaviour too much for parents. Both in care together.
One whose family were very dysfunctional and the girl did not have the relationship with her mother she craved, allegedly given cider that night and strong medication her mum took and the girl was told so it was reported she told the girl on the visit to, "F. Off and kill yourself".
Care in the community, when a vulnerable person is given a house, instead of mental health in care and supported housing.
Social service care, when those who need boundaries and curfews the most are not given any.
They can basically do as they please. Not turn up, cancel meetings.
Basically, the behaviour of indulgent parents.

They were able to visit the victims home and knew she would give them alcohol.

This was reported in the Mail last week and there crimes and actions need strong consequences.
isn't it time we looked back to when society worked in the 60's and 70's.
Because both my husband who was in the police service and I think it was in the 80's.

Discipline and education was dumbed down. The family and marriage was being overtaken, by a benefit system that was being allowed to encourage families who did not have to take responsibility.
Drugs were getting hold on the estates. Older boys, meets young girl. Cannabis is introduced.
The media and music industry promoted the likes of Madonna and the young were introduced to brands and a shallow celebrity world.
18 videos were allowed in homes. TV decided to educate with programmes like Grange Hill, that brought drugs talk to the playground that had the opposite effect.
Today the music videos I have seen, one with a background of a polytunnel with cannabis growing. The gangsta drug influence is easily accessible.
In fact as young males are going to speak to referral officers about their behaviour they can access computers for info sit and easily access these videos, with a notice not to use bad language and not to bring knives into the building.
A referral school I have been into had pupils work on the wall with art with cannabis plants on it.

Andrew Griffiths MP describes the neglect, injuries and violent death, at 21 months of age of Ayesha Jane Smith, caused by her own mother, adding:

"... Yet Ayesha had been known to social services since the day she was born. They knew about the violent boyfriend. They knew about the domestic violence. They saw the doors kicked-in. They smelt the cannabis. [...] And they did nothing. The prime minister will understand that the people of Burton want to know how this could have happened."

Further relevant details are reported in full in the Daily Mail's coverage of the court case from 18th March.

Firstly, thank you very much for taking the time to answer at such length.

Peter Hitchens inserted questions and stats into your post so I'm sure you'll answer any questions about that part in your reply to him.

Tyranny, alcohol and increased leisure:

1) Efforts to hinder people making bad choices like giving themselves up to drink, don't necessarily led to any for of tyranny especially the brutal one you describe. Just because in one society strict laws are enacted and enforced (though this is disputed by Mr Hitchens) in the moral belief they are for people's good, doesn't mean other strategies won't work.
2) I've never drunk hard but have dealt with thousands of drunks. Very unhappy people. In its advanced stages, it's true the craving may be forever. But nipped in the bud -- yes, very much for their own good -- many could be saved. To be free from the alcohol and everything that it brings would be their dearest wish.
3) I didn't mean to imply that drug use leds people not to work; it's the other way round. Hang the official statistics: more and more people will not have to work for a variety of reasons. There's already a lot of mooching and boozing and puffing going on -- slash the price of the drugs and that'll increase; legalise them and you'll have Tesco vans bringing the stuff round and whole districts will be like that island where everyone lolled about high on Lotus leaves.

The situation in America is a mixed bag, since both state and federal law cover cannabis, and as a result there can be great discrepancies in the legal position. Four states have legalised recreational cannabis: Alaska, Colorado Oregon and Washington State, and more are expected to follow suit lster this year, and many other allow varying degrees of medicinal use. While on the other hand in Arizona, first-time cannabis possession is a felony, [a serious crime, as opposed to a misdemeanour]. Annually 22,000 Arizonans are arrested for simple possession and 92% are prosecuted.

***PH asks: But what actually happens to them? Drug liberalisers like to give arrest figures, which readers here know don't mean anything by themselves. What matters are the numbers convicted, and what sentences they are actually given, if any. They also cite paper maximum penalties which are seldom if ever imposed, or vague claims about large numbers going to jail for 'drug-related offences', most of which are violent offences connected with supply.

According to Maricopa County Attorney Bill Montgomery (Arizona Capitol Times 12th Feb 2014) '...the idea that Arizona’s prisons are full of marijuana-possession offenders doesn’t hold up. According to the 2011 Arizona Sentencing Report from the Arizona Prosecuting Attorneys’ Advisory Council, about 95 percent of inmates in Arizona’s prison system have committed multiple or violent felonies.'

Large numbers of those convicted of marijuana possession charges go on non-custodial 'diversion programmes'. I'd be interested to see more detailed Arizona stats. These were all I could find in a swift search.***

Louisiana uses "repeat drug offender" statutes for cannabis possession and as such has a number of people serving long sentences for possession.

***PH: Is he sure? Since passage of House Bill 149 last June, penalties for marijuana possession in Louisiana are much reduced.
This document http://www.in.gov/ipac/files/Whos_Really_in_Prison_for_Marijuana.pdf
questions claims about large numbers being in prison in the US *for* simple marijuana possession. They may have been convicted for marijuana possession too, but they are usually in prison for something else. So 0.7% of State prisoners, repeat 0.7%, were there for possession alone. And ''The numbers on the federal level tell a similar story. Out of all drug defendantsentenced in federal court for marijuana
crimes in 2001, the overwhelming majority
were convicted for trafficking, according to the U.S.
Sentencing Commission.
Only 2.3 percent—186 people -received sentences for simple possession, and of the 174
for whom sentencing information is known, just 63 actually served time behind bars.'***

Florida routinely sentences people for first time cannabis possession to the mandatory one year in prison plus a fine.

***PH asks: When he says 'routinely' what does he mean? Can he provide stats on how many such sentences are passed in the most recent year for which figures are available?' ***

Federal law is generally only used for large, multi-state or international cannabis cases, but when it does act the sentences are severe.

What is the result of this? America is now the land of the midnight drugs raid, where armed men from a militarised police force throw stun grenades through windows, kick down the door, shoot your dog and terrorise your children, and drag you off to jail for cannabis possession.

***PH asks: Please give instances of such events, in which the arrested person is a first offender and charged *only* with simple possession of marijuana in small quantities, i.e. not for sale or supply. ***

Remember, they do all of this to save people from themselves.

Do I believe cannabis is dangerous? I certainly believe, and medical evidence has demonstrated it to be so, that cannabis use by adolescents is damaging to their health. As for adults, those prone to mental illness should probably not use cannabis, though many report self-medicating with cannabis to prevent their troubled mental state. How to discourage people from certain behaviour? The most obvious is *NOT* through prohibition. That just drives the activity underground making those who indulge furtive and deviant, and not approachable for discussion.

Cannabis legalisation will help deal with these problems in many ways. Firstly, if the activity is legal campaigns can be launched, which most people listen to and follow, take note of the drinking and smoking health campaigns.

***PH notes: yes, and take note of their widespread failure***

All this could, and I hope will be done with cannabis. Also, and this is an important point. Cannabis is not a single uniform substance. It is a mixture of several different substances, of which THC and CBD are the most important. CBD seems to act as an anti-psychotic, protecting people from the worst effects. Legalisation would allow people to choose from different types of cannabis until they found one which suited them best. Legalisation will put and end to these horrible "legal highs", which people use because real cannabis is illegal, and are truly dangerous and damaging.

Should people be protected from themselves? Their leads a path into tyranny. Armed men kicking in doors, terrorising your children and shooting the family dog is a strange kind of protection. Next time they come to protect you or your friends in this way, remind them they aren't needed. I doubt many alcoholics, [or at least the ones I know], would wash your feet with tears, and you'd be waiting a long time for them to forget drink existed.

More and more people not working? Really? Every time our idiot chancellor appears in public he is always touting the economy as being full of new, low-wage, zero hours, mind numbingly repetitive jobs, so I think that, in fact, less and less are not working, but either way I think these trends are driven by factors like, globalisation, late-stage capitalism, and information technology rather than drugs. Rather, it is contemporary life which pushes many people towards drugs. Reform this if you want to alter the trend, but regardless of economic trends, the use of a simple plant, known and used by humanity since ancient days, should not be prohibited.

I can tell you that over 40 years ago, early 70's new mothers had two weeks in hospital and visits every day from a midwife. My second child I came home within a day, and old hand eager to get into routine, with daily visits.
That this little girl was around two and when mine were this age we had to go to the clinic weekly as the months went on where babies were undressed and weighed and we were given vitamin drops.
There were visits from health visitors in the early years to the home and we took them to clinic for hearing and speech checks.
My two were slim little things as I was always walking them on reins, something I wish I would see today.
What I remember about my community is there were lots of us mums new and older about. We didn't miss a lot going on and so many of us were married and our mums and aunts we visited, they visited. Gardens were full of paddling pools and swings.
The idea that a young women could have a baby, several different partners and we would not see the effects of drug use or hear domestic violence just wouldn't have been thought of.
The idea that young women could be funded, given a flat and be allowed to continue that life, was so far away from my age of 22 with two young babies and the authorities and services would come together and be set up to let this situation would be unthinkable then.
Young married mums, healthy and happy was the norm in my children's young life.

By the way I hear there is an argument this week about informing the young of declining fertility. A rush to say we mustn't. Even though I learnt all that in biology!
Yet schools are quick to send my grandchildren home with literature on and homework on drugs when at school and younger.

I am wondering if all these police, social services abuse agencies are afraid to tell the real story of how widespread this is and why are not speaking out about cannabis.
In the article I read in the Mail the fire service warned the services that when they went to fit a fireproof letter box, because the current partner had threatened to burn the house, that they were concerned the mother was spaced out and there was a strong smell of cannabis.
No action. This child was failed, by those who have come to see this as a normal way of life they deal with.
So far removed from my time as a young mum, but now as a grandmother, it doesn't shock me and that's the sad part.
Because unless the real cause is treated and the mantra lessons will be learned continues, we will see more of this.

@ William Falconer (in reply to his to me posted up the day before yesterday)

The situation in America sounds very extreme: puritan laws with harsh penalties; hedonists and utter corruption.

1) Do you believe cannabis can be dangerous, and if so how would you discourage people from using it, at least to excess?
2) What do you think of the idea that we sometimes need protecting from ourselves (most alcoholics would wash your feet with tears of joy if you locked them in a room until they forgot there was such a thing as drink)?
3) More and more people never work; many wile away their time intoxicated. Wouldn't cheaper, more available drugs simply encourage this trend?

I should perhaps have been more specific. When I referred to police unions, I meant in the USA, where their opposition to ending cannabis prohibition is well-known. In the UK the police are a lot more muted, most calls for legalisation come from high-ranking officers. The refreshingly honest exception has been the Scottish Police Federation, who have made several calls for the Misuse of Drugs Act to be repealed and drugs legalised. However, it is what happens in the USA which counts. Drug prohibition is almost without exception an American creation, from the 1914 Harrison Narcotics Act, to demanding signatories to the Versailles Treaty pass legislation for drug prohibition, to their lobbying the UN into passing the Single Convention 1961, through the Nixon, Reagan and Clinton escalations of the drug war, prohibition has always been the American answer to intoxication, because unlike Europeans, the US culturally regards intoxication as a sin, not just another facet of human behaviour, and is by nature a prohibition society, unlike Europe. This of course is the root of Mr Hitchens' crusade against cannabis: he believes it to be a sin. All the rest of his arguments follow on from there.

My point was to rebutt Mr Hitchens' bogeyman of "Big Dope", and to provide concrete examples of powerful lobbies who have used their influence to prevent it. While we're at it, lets not forget the security and intelligence services who surely oppose drug legalisation simply because they are up to their necks in the drug trafficking business, [read Alfred McCoys The Politics of Heroin if you dont believe me], and no doubt their murky friends in organised crime. They have the most to lose of all, after all they owe their very existence to drug prohibition. Repealing prohibition will severely curtail their activities, as has been proven in Colorado, where cannabis legalisation has taken a big bite from their profits!

Mr Hitchens offers only repetition of the same tired old policies which have done nothing to either prevent or reduce drug use in over a century. Look at the United States, where a protracted and very real war against drugs has been fought for almost all of the last 100 years. Many states impose swinging, draconian punishments to enforce these prohibitions, and all fail. Mr Hitchens is aware, I'm quite sure, that there are a number of people in the USA serving life sentences without possibility of parole for cannabis offences.
***PH notes: Not for simple possession, there aren't *** What message does it send when our criminal justice system routinely hands out longer sentences for non-violent drug "crimes" than it does for violent offences, including murder? Somehow believing they are saving people from themselves by destroying their lives and families through arrest, imprisonment and a criminal record? Or could it be possible, in fact, that drug prohibition has been, from beginning to end, an exercise in racism; about demonising and persecuting minorities by outlawing their habits and recreation? The evidence would suggest so.

Mrs B.
I could not agree more with your comments about that poor child . That pair would not have got past the lady Health Visitor I had 30 odd years ago , She would have had that child away to safety and not given her back to her "mother" without a fight , without any hesitation . Due to circumstances beyond my control I had sole custody of my three children for 2 years , every aspect of how I looked after my children was looked at in great detail by that Lady before this sole custody was confirmed by the court . Are there such people about now ? Or has the human rights lobby made it impossible for them to do their job properly ?

Regarding lessons to be learnt over the sad case of little Ayeesha Smith.
As long as the bar is set so low that after monthly meetings with all the agencies they consider that it is acceptable to return little ones to families with a history of cannabis or drug use. To smell the,"fug" of cannabis on visits, to accept explanations of another mark, another hospital visit.
That this particular habit was funded by benefits. That when drug use is happening, it goes hand in hand with lies and manipulation to stop the interruption of that habit.
That children often mean increased benefits, not all obviously, but the child taken away means loss of some benefits, loss of a fund to fund their habit.
Then there is the relationship, where two are on drugs and this doubles the risk. The choice of partners, the violence that is linked and comes with the more entrenched drugs use.
Until they change the mindset of returning a young child from foster care where she was finally thriving and return her to one where she wasn't, because there is some strange idea that the child will do better in a family with umpteen issues and a top priority of drugs and getting them.
That the child somehow will benefit from a living in a chaotic, selfish household.
it is the mindset of all officials involved...

Another point I do not understand how so many hospital visits did not build up a great big red flag.
Where were the health visitors we used to have come in during the first year, the developmental checks at clinics?

And now a test for Abrahamic faith, as it is, where data is collected, massively over represented among criminals, the harm it does needs serious investigation with a view to ban with stiff legal penalties for those propagating said harm.

William Falconer.
read your comments , I ask ,in my response to your question to Mr Hitchens , who " big dope lobby" is , would such a grouping of companies or individuals be able to openly campaign for legalisation , is it not a criminal offence to deal illegal drugs ? would they feel the risk of imprisonment for doing so worthwhile ? They would not be campaigning against slavery or racial segregation or female emancipation to give some examples of campaigns to change a Law .
Happy Sunday .

Dieter Kaufmann was a heavy user of cannabis and mentally ill and had just been released from prison following a five and a half year sentence when he tried to assassinate German politician Wolfgang Schauble, who has been in a wheelchair ever since.

You say the police unions are lobbying hard to prevent the legalisation of cannabis; but why then aren't the police enforcing the existing laws against the possession of this drug? It's got to the point where dozens of students will raise their hand on camera to indicate they've taken an illegal drug. If anti-drugs laws are floated like this, isn't cannabis effectively legal already?

A couple of years ago I started reading your column to better understand the arguments against the position of legalisation in the hope I could improve my arguments in favour of legalisation. In the end it had the opposite effect; I came to realise the folly of my opinion, which was undoubtedly held for conformist reasons and because, apart from my parents, no authority figure from teacher to policemen had ever articulated an anti-drugs position to me - it was a constant theme of harm reduction and Talk To Frank style propaganda.

***PH writes: Thank you. That is most encouraging. But I fear that there aren't many on the legalisation side who are curious about their opponents. I have taken part in so many debates where those opponents have, given the chance for rebuttal, completely ignored what I have actually said, both the facts and the logic. It's not they have tried and failed to counter them. It's that they have behaved as if they haven't heard a word. It's almost invariable. Howard Marks is a rare exception ***

So keep fighting the good fight Mr Hitchens, the seeds of doubt may germinate quicker than you think.

As usual you parade your standard collection of scare stories, half-truths and appeals to emotion rather than a genuine logical position. In the spirit of genuine, factual debate, would you be kind enough to tell us who exactly are the "well financed" forces you call Big Dope. Constant repetition of a slogan does not make something truthful.

As I pointed out in a previous post, which you chose not to display, far from there being some sinister Big Dope lobby angling for legalisation, there are in fact several well financed lobby groups using every ounce of political leverage to prevent legalisation. These include, but are not limited to, the pharmaceutical corporations, the alcohol and tobacco corporations, the private prison corporations, the police unions. These groups opposition to cannabis legalisation is proven and ongoing. So I ask again, please show who this well financed legalisation lobby. Your comments on medical cannabis are absurd.

One final thing, I hate to disapoint you, but the only place you won that debate was in your own mind. As well as losing the vote, you conclusively lost the argument. Why? Because your views are anachronistic, simplistic, and offer only the continuation of an obviously failed paradigm as a solution, one which people only need to look across the Atlantic, to the so-called "land of the free", [which has the biggest prison population in the world], to see how miserably the attempt by the state to use the blunt instrument of the criminal law to prevent intoxication has failed. When you ask people to consider ideas with an open mind, I suggest you apply this standard to yourself to begin with.

The Billionaire George Soros has a track record of supporting financially things which might seem benign . The Arab Spring which lead to Egypt's Muslim Brotherhood . Black Lives Matter which caused the cops to avoid rough areas so that more black lives where lost. He is an advocate of large scale migration into the EU but later claimed that Putin was using it to damage the EU via Syria.
As he is 85 and very rich I doubt that his support for cannabis being commercially sold is about money.

You'll also find that these violent criminals are more likely to be sexually promiscuous, to smoke, to drink to excess and to be ignorant, unpleasant and foul-mouthed. (Some of them, of course, are intoxicated by religious fanaticism.)

I agree with you - broadly speaking - on the issue of recreational drugs, but you'll need better arguments than this to make your case.

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